DejaVu077
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India has killed 10 mln girls in 20 years -minister
14 Dec 2006 12:08:45 GMT
Source: Reuters
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By Palash Kumar
NEW DELHI, Dec 14 (Reuters) - Ten million girls have been killed by their parents in India in the past 20 years, either before they were born or immediately after, a government minister said on Thursday, describing it as a "national crisis".
A UNICEF report released this week said 7,000 fewer girls are born in the country every day than the global average would suggest, largely because female foetuses are aborted after sex determination tests but also through murder of new borns.
"It's shocking figures and we are in a national crisis if you ask me," Minister for Women and Child Development Renuka Chowdhury told Reuters.
Girls are seen as liabilities by many Indians, especially because of the banned but rampant practice of dowry, where the bride's parents pay cash and goods to the groom's family.
Men are also seen as bread-winners while social prejudices deny women opportunities for education and jobs.
"Today, we have the odd distinction of having lost 10 million girl children in the past 20 years," Chowdhury told a seminar in Delhi University.
"Who has killed these girl children? Their own parents."
In some states, the minister said, newborn girls have been killed by pouring sand or tobacco juice into their nostrils.
"The minute the child is born and she opens her mouth to cry, they put sand into her mouth and her nostrils so she chokes and dies," Chowdhury said, referring to cases in the western desert state of Rajasthan.
"They bury infants into pots alive and bury the pots. They put tobacco into her mouth. They hang them upside down like a bunch of flowers to dry," she said.
"We have more passion for tigers of this country. We have people fighting for stray dogs on the road. But you have a whole society that ruthlessly hunts down girl children."
According to the 2001 census, the national sex ratio was 933 girls to 1,000 boys, while in the worst-affected northern state of Punjab, it was 798 girls to 1,000 boys.
The ratio has fallen since 1991, due to the availability of ultrasound sex-determination tests.
Although these are illegal they are still widely available and often lead to abortion of girl foetuses.
Chowdhury said the fall in the number of females had cost one percent of India's GDP and created shortages of girls in some states like Haryana, where in one case four brothers had to marry one woman.
Economic empowerment of women was key to change, she said.
"Even today when you go to a temple, you are blessed with 'May you have many sons'," she said.
"The minute you empower them to earn more or equal (to men), social prejudices vanish."
The practice of killing the girl child is more prevalent among the educated, including in upmarket districts of New Delhi, making it more challenging for the government, the minister said.
"How do we tell educated people that you must not do it? And these are people who would visit all the female deities and pray for strength but don't hesitate to kill a girl child," she said.
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Frankenstein
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they should rather send them to china,,by 2020 china will be one of the few
countries havin more men than women..
Smooth_daddy
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DV77, thanks for posting this important topic.
I am really very sad to see reaction from JB audience. There is hardly any reaction on this topic except for sympathies.
Friends, is this not a replica of pre-Islamic Arab society? Because people do not believe that needs of person born are the responsibility of its creator, they think they are the providers and one more mouth to feed means less for everybody else.
A society tolerant of child killing and gender discrimination is being portrayed as a power in the region. Karo Kari, though another henious crime, is much less rampant then killing infant girls, yet is publicised more. I am sure you know why -- because it is committed in a so called Islamic Country.
Ashii
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SD
it also made me think of "zamana e jahilayat"
but speaking frankly Im unable to define zamana e jahaliya as pre-islamic.....
I dont know wots better
killing a foetus before it borns or dishonoring a woman and/or kiling her at the name of "religion"
girls killing is also very common in china coz of their strict family planning law (one kid per couple)
lets pass such a law in pak,, and then see the result
I wont b surprised..................
lykin yeh sab perh ker bahut afsurda hoon 
